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Katherine Joslin

Professor of English
Joslin@wmich.edu

I am the author of Jane Addams, A Writer’s Life (University of Illinois Press, 2004) and Edith Wharton in the Women Writer’s Series (Macmillan and St. Martin’s Press, 1991). My scholarly work focuses on writers at the turn into the twentieth century, such writers as Addams and Wharton and also Willa Cather, Kate Chopin, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, and Theodore Dreiser in America and Virginia Woolf and Emile Zola in Europe. In my classes, I bring social, intellectual and political history together with literary studies, using interdisciplinary American studies perspectives. Currently, I am looking at the literary nature of books written by social, political, and scientific writers, including Addams, Theodore Roosevelt, and Rachel Carson.


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Education
PhD Northwestern University, American Literature, Harrison Hayford, Director
MA Northwestern University, English
BA Oakland University, magna cum laude, English

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Teaching
Professor of English, WMU, 1997
Associate Professor of English, WMU, 1991-96
Assistant Professor of English, WMU, 1986-1990
Assistant Professor of English, Iowa State University, 1985-86
Instructor, Northwestern University, 1984-85

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Administration
Director, Program in American Studies, WMU, 1999-2004
Director, Graduate Studies, English Department, WMU, 1997-99
Assistant to the Dean for Curriculum, College of Arts & Science, WMU, 1995-96

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Professional Development
Management Development Program, Harvard University, June 2000
Seminar for Directors, American Studies Association, Montreal, 1999; Seattle, 1998
Seminar for Graduate Directors, Modern Language Association, Lowell, June, 1997
Institute in Integrative Studies, Miami University of Ohio, June, 1996

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Grants
Fulbright Summer Institute for the Study of the United States, P.I., 2001, $176,000
Fulbright Summer Institute for the Study of the United States, P.I., 2000, $172,000
USIA Summer Institute in American Studies, P.I., 1999, $170,000
Professional Activities Grant, WMU, 1993, $1000
Faculty Research Grant, Provost’s Office, WMU, 1991, $1500
Faculty Research Fellowship, WMU, 1987, $3000
New Faculty Research Grant, WMU, 1987, $2000
Graduate Research Grant, Northwestern University, 1982, $500
Alumnae Fellowship, NU, 1981, $6000

 

 

 

 

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Awards
Alumni Excellence in Teaching Award, WMU, 1997
Nomination, Michigan State Teaching Award, 1990
Administrative Merit Awards, WMU, 2000, 1999, 1998, 1997, 1994, 1991, 1990
Dean of Arts and Sciences Merit Award, WMU, 1996
Department Merit Awards, 1996, 1995, 1994, 1993, 1992, 1991, 1990, 1989, 1988
Sabbatical Leave Awards, 2000-01, 1993-94

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Books
Jane Addams, A Writer’s Life (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2004).

Edith Wharton, Women Writer’s Series, general editors, Eva Figes and Adele King (London: Macmillan Publishers Limited, 1991; New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1991; paperback edition, 1994).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Edited Books and Introductions
American Feminism: Key Source Documents, 1848-1920, edited by Janet Beer, Anne-Marie Ford and Katherine Joslin, 4 volumes (London and New York: Routledge, 2003); Introductions to Volume III and IV by Katherine Joslin.

A New Conscience and an Ancient Evil by Jane Addams, new edition with Introduction by Katherine Joslin (Urbana and Chicago, University of Illinois Press, 2002).

Peace and Bread in Time of War by Jane Addams, new edition with Introduction by Katherine Joslin (Urbana and Chicago, University of Illinois Press, 2002).

Wretched Exotic: Essay on Edith Wharton in Europe, edited by Katherine Joslin and Alan Price (New York: Peter Lang, 1993; paperback edition, 1996).

 

 

 

 

 

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Chapters in Books
“Honest Reminiscence: Jane Addams on War and Peace,” in Landscapes of Memory, edited by Isabel Gil (Lisbon: Catholic University of Portugal Press, 2004).

“Jane Addams as Naturalist: Turning the Theory Inside Out” in Twisted from the Ordinary: Essays on American Literary Naturalism, edited by Mary E. Papke (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 2003).

“‘Embattled Tendencies’: Wharton, Woolf and the Dialogics of Modernism” in Special Relationships: Anglo-American Antagonisms and Affinities, 1854-1938, edited by Janet Beer and Bridget Bennett (Manchester and New York: Manchester University Press, 2002).

“Jane Addams” in Dictionary of Midwestern Literature: Volume One, The Authors, general editor, Philip A. Greasley (Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2001).

“Architectonic or Episodic?: Edith Wharton, Gender, and The Fruit of the Tree" in A Forward Glance: New Essays on Edith Wharton, edited by Clare Colquitt, Susan Goodman, and Candace Waid (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1999; London: Associated University Presses, 1999).

“Slum Angels: The White Slave Narrative in Theodore Dreiser’s Jennie Gerhardt,” in Women, Migration and Movement: Narratives of Relocation, edited by Susan L. Roberson (Columbia and London: University of Missouri Press, 1998).

“Literary Cross-Dressing: Jane Addams Finds Her Voice in Democracy and Social Ethics,” in Femmes de conscience: Aspects du feminisme Americain, 1848-1875 (Paris: Sorbonne Press, 1994).

“Fleeing the Sewer: George Sand, Edith Wharton, and Literary Innovation,” in Wretched Exotic (1993).

“Finding the Self at Home: Chopin’s The Awakening and Cather’s The Professor’s House” in Kate Chopin Reconsidered: Beyond the Bayou, edited by Lynda Boren and Sara deSaussure Davis (Baton Rouge and London: Louisiana State University Press, 1992).

 

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Essays and Reviews

“Diseases of the Body Politic: Jane Addams and Charlotte Perkins Gilman,” Janet Beer and Katherine Joslin, Journal of American Studies, lead essay, issue on Women in America (Fall 1999).

Review of Personal Property by Margit Stange, Modern Fiction Studies (Fall 1999).

“Experimental Moralist: Jane Addams as Storyteller,” Excavatio, volume VIII (Fall 1997).

“Edith Wharton in Paris,” Edith Wharton Review, guest editors with introduction, Katherine Joslin and Alan Price (Spring 1992).

“Reading Wharton’s Letters,” essay/review of The Letters of Edith Wharton, edited by RWB Lewis and Nancy Lewis, Review, volume 12 (1990).

“Edith Wharton at 125, College Literature, XIV, 3 (Fall 1987); lead essay.

“Reply to Louis Auchincloss,” Wharton Newsletter, II, 2 (Fall 1984).

“What Lubbock Didn’t Say,” Wharton Newsletter, I, 1 (Spring 1984).

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Referee at Presses and Journals

University of Illinois Press, 2004

PMLA, 2001

University Press of Florida, 2000

University of Arizona Press, 1998

Northeastern University Press, 1994

Peter Lang Publishers, 1994

 

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Conference Papers

“‘I Want to Know the Truth’: Mary Church Terrell and the Rape of White Women,” Session on Non-Fiction Prose, Modern Language Association, Philadelphia, December, 2004.

“The Art of Science Writing: Jane Addams and Rachel Carson,” NEW-CUE Conference, Boothbay, Maine, June, 2004.

“Honest Reminiscence: Jane Addams on War and Peace,” Keynote Address, “Landscapes of Memory: Envisaging the Past/Remembering the Future,” Portuguese Anglo-American Studies, Catholic University of Portugal, Lisbon, April, 2003.

“Jane Addams and Sophie Chen: Reading the Letters,” Plenary Address, “Sino/US Relations at the Turn of the Century,” Northeastern University, Shenyang, China, May, 2001.

“Playing with the Big Boys: Jane Addams and William James,” Special Session, “Fictions of Peace,” Modern Language Association, Washington DC, December, 2000.

“Living in the City: Jane Addams and Charlotte Perkins Gilman in Chicago,” with Janet Beer, “Still at Issue: Progressive Era Women Writers,” American Studies Association, Montreal, October, 1999.

“Jane Addams and Charlotte Perkins Gilman: Diseases of the Body Politic,” with Janet Beer, Gilman Conference, Skidmore College, Saratoga Spring, June, 1997.

“Dislocation in the Regional Writing of Willa Cather and Anzia Yezierska,” with Janet Beer, “History, Memory and Critique, International Society for the Study of European Ideas, Utrecht, August, 1996.

“Slum Angels: Adams and Dreiser on Poor Women in Chicago,” Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth-Century Division, MLA, Chicago, December 1995.

“Beware! Addams and Wharton on White Slavery,” Youngstown University Conference, “Working-Class Studies, Working-Class Lives, Youngstown, June, 1995.

Women’s Poetry, Poster Presentation, NGO Forum, Fourth United Nations Conference on Women, Huairou, China, Septemeber, 1995.

“Jane Addams and Theodore Dreiser on White Slavery,” American Literature Association, San Diego, May, 1994.

“Fleeing the Sewer: George Sand, Edith Wharton, and Literary Innovation,” Edith Wharton Society, “Edith Wharton in Paris,” Paris, June, 1991.

“Life-Giving Spirit: Edith Wharton’s Letters to Women,” American Culture Association, Toronto, March, 1990.
“Spectral Desire: Facing Middle Age in Wharton’s The Mother’s Recompense, American Culture Association, St. Louis, April, 1989.

“Edith Wharton’s Place in the Literary Canon,” University of Groningen, Groningen, June, 1988.

“Woman Hater (?): Pussy Wharton’s Letters to Sally Norton and Daisy Chanler,” Edith Wharton Society, “Edith Wharton: Woman of Letters,” New York, October, 1988.

“Vernon Lee and Lily Bart: Edith Wharton’s Feminism,” MLA, San Francisco, December, 1987.

“Literary Longevity,” Plenary Address, Edith Wharton Society, “Edith Wharton at The Mount,” Lenox, June, 1987.

“What Percy Lubbock Didn’t Say about Edith Wharton,” MLA, New York, December, 1983.

“Nineteenth-Century Female Relationships: Decoding the Letters,” Northwestern University, 1981.

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Chair and Director at Conferences

Chair, “Fictions of Peace: Women Writers in the Progressive Era,” MLA, Washington DC, December, 2000.

Chair, “Ghosting, Taking, Making Lives,” Auto/Biography and Life Writing, MLA, Toronto, 1997.

Delegate, Citizen Ambassador People to People Program, United States/China Joint Conference on Women Issues, Beijing, August, 1996.

Chair, “The View from New York: Wharton, Whitman, and Cahan,” MLA, New York, December, 1993.

Chair, “Depicting Community,” American Literature Association, San Diego, June, 1993.

Director, “Edith Wharton in Paris,” Mona Bismarck Foundation, Paris, June 28-July 1, 1991 (120 participants from 10 countries).

Co-Director, National Wharton Conference, “Edith Wharton at The Mount,” Lenox, June, 1987.

Chair, “Versions of Community,” American Literature I Session, Midwest MLA, St. Louis, November, 1990.

Chair, “Edith Wharton and Naturalism,” Special Session, MLA, Chicago, December, 1985.

 

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University Committees

Strategic Planning Committee, Arts and Sciences, 2000-01

North Central Accreditation Committee, 1999-2000

Undergraduate Studies Council, 1999

Graduate Studies Council, 1998-2000; 1995-97

Chair, Tenure and Promotion Committee, English, 1998-99; member 1997-98

Chair, Policy Committee, English, 1994-95, 1990-91

Chair, College Curriculum Committee, 1995-96, 1992-93

 

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Associations

Modern Language Association, 1892-present
American Studies Association, 1998-present
Association for the Study of Literature and Environment, 1997-present
Edith Wharton Society, 1985-present; president, 1985; Executive Board, 1985-93
Irwin Union Bank, Advisory Board, 2001-present

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